North Carolina's carbon emissions are down, but not on track to meet goals - - The Daily Tar Heel
North Carolina's carbon emissions are down, but not on track to meet goals -
The N.C. Department of Environmental Quality released a statewide report on Jan. 31 showing a significant decline in greenhouse gas emissions, which fell 38 percent from 2005 to 2020.
Shawn Taylor, the public information officer for the N.C. Division of Air Quality, said the division releases a scheduled update to the state greenhouse gas inventory every two years. The current update includes estimates of all greenhouse gas emissions and carbon sinks, he said.
To some extent, coal-powered plants are being replaced by natural gas, as well as renewable electricity such as solar and wind power, Noah Kittner, an assistant professor of environmental sciences and engineering at UNC, said.
He said the inventory shows the state made progress in making the electricity grid cleaner.
“It doesn't mean that we're not emitting anything,” he said. ”It's just the rate at which we're emitting carbon has decreased.”
House Bill 951, signed by Gov. Roy Cooper in October 2021, requires a 70 percent reduction rate of emissions by 2030 and aims for carbon neutrality by 2050.
The law proposed reduction through the retirement of coal-powered plants with the N.C. Utilities Commission’s Carbon Plan, prompting Duke Energy to retire 8,400 megawatts of its coal-powered plants by 2035 to meet the 70 percent goal. Duke Energy was also required to hold stakeholder meetings on offshore wind power production as a part of the state’s plan.
Despite these efforts, Kittner said the state is not on track to meet the goals included in H.B. 951, and that the state would need to reduce emissions much more to reach carbon neutrality.
According to the report, transportation emissions are now the largest emitter of greenhouse gas emissions in the state. The state has not seen emissions from transportation get cleaner because people are driving more due to a lack of low-cost public transportation, Kittner said.
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